DeFi protocols are locking down or abandoning Discord assist as scams, DM phishing and a Zendesk-linked ID breach expose customers to escalating safety and impersonation dangers.
Abstract
- Morpho will swap its public Discord to learn‑solely from Feb. 1, 2026, steering customers to Intercom-style ticketed assist with translation and automation as an alternative of open chats.
- DefiLlama and others now favor stay chat and e mail tickets, arguing Discord makes it “inconceivable” to totally block DM scams even with verification and stricter moderation.
- An October breach of Discord’s Zendesk assist vendor uncovered round 2 million passport and driver’s license pictures from age‑verification appeals, intensifying privateness issues.
Decentralized finance protocols are withdrawing from public Discord servers, citing safety issues because the platform has turn out to be a goal for scammers, in line with trade bulletins and protocol executives.
Morpho, a significant DeFi lending protocol, introduced this week that its public Discord server can be positioned into read-only mode from February 1, 2026. The protocol acknowledged it might redirect customers to a devoted assist web page and chat-based assist system as an alternative.
DeFi groups and Discord
The choice displays issues amongst DeFi groups that Discord has turn out to be a venue for scammers who goal customers looking for help, in line with the protocol’s announcement. Morpho acknowledged the change was aimed toward offering “safer, extra dependable assist” by means of managed channels quite than open chat rooms.
Paul Frambot, Morpho’s co-founder and chief government, acknowledged that Discord had turn out to be “extra unfavourable than optimistic” from a person assist perspective, citing persistent noise and rip-off makes an attempt regardless of moderation efforts.
Morpho co-founder Merlin Egalite mentioned the platform’s construction made it troublesome to totally shield customers from direct-message scams, even with safeguards in place. Egalite acknowledged the group has been testing various instruments, together with Intercom, which provided options equivalent to ticketing, prompt translation, and automatic help whereas lowering publicity to impersonation assaults.
DeFi information platform DefiLlama has additionally moved away from Discord, shifting towards stay assist chats and email-based ticket methods, in line with its founder. The platform’s pseudonymous founder, often known as 0xngmi, acknowledged Discord makes it “inconceivable to guard customers from getting scammed.” DefiLlama has adopted a hybrid method, conserving Discord accessible behind further verification steps whereas directing most customers towards various assist channels.
Marc Zeller, founding father of Aavechan Initiative, known as Discord “filled with scammers” and acknowledged Morpho’s transfer ought to immediate different main protocols to rethink their reliance on the platform. Duncan Cock Foster, co-founder of Nifty Gateway, acknowledged Discord moderation had been some of the exhausting processes of his enterprise and described Morpho’s determination as affordable.
The shift has prompted debate throughout the DeFi neighborhood in regards to the trade-offs of abandoning open neighborhood areas. Some neighborhood members have argued that Discord, regardless of its safety points, has been central to peer-to-peer collaboration, permitting customers to share experiences and comply with improvement discussions in actual time, in line with social media commentary. Others have countered that options equivalent to disabling direct messages, stronger verification, and on-chain tooling can considerably cut back rip-off exercise if correctly carried out.
Safety issues round Discord have been heightened by an October incident during which the corporate confirmed that an unauthorized occasion accessed a third-party Zendesk assist system, exposing delicate information linked to age verification appeals. Cybersecurity researchers claimed that greater than two million passport and driver’s license pictures have been exfiltrated within the breach, elevating questions on information dealing with practices on the platform.
